Bouncer accused of murdering French student

A wheel clamper and nightclub bouncer was charged yesterday with the murder two years ago of a French student, Amelie Delagrange, and the attempted murder of two other women.

Levi Bellfield, 37, formerly of West Drayton, west London, was also accused of the attempted abduction and false imprisonment of a fourth woman. Bellfield is due to appear at Bow Street magistrates' court today charged with six offences relating to the four women, including the Delagrange murder, Scotland Yard said.

Miss Delagrange, 22, was found with fatal head injuries near the cricket pitch on Twickenham Green in south-west London in August 2004, after a night out. She had been attacked as she crossed the green in the dark.

Her parents, Jean-Franois and Dominique Delagrange, and her sister, Virginie, said after her death that her "radiance and joy of living" had been ended by the actions of a predator and the family had suffered indescribable pain.

Bellfield was also charged with the attempted murder of a former convent school head girl, Kate Sheedy, as well as attempted murder, and causing grievous bodily harm, in relation to Irma Dragoshi.

Miss Sheedy, then 18, was knocked down by a car as she walked home though Isleworth, west London, from a night out in May 2004. She managed to use her mobile phone to call home and whisper to her mother: "I'm dying."

The attempted murder of Miss Dragoshi, and the alternative offence of causing grievous bodily harm, are alleged to have taken place in Longford, west London, in December 2003.

Bellfield was further charged with trying to kidnap Anne Maria Rennie in October 2001, when she was 17. Miss Rennie was at a bus stop in Twickenham, west London. She managed to escape.